a little bit 18th century, a little bit 24th century

Category Archives: News/Politics

There are times when I wish I was a celebrity, or at least that this blog got several thousand page views a day, because I have something I want to say to everyone in America, something I want everyone to hear and listen to. Oh well, I’m going to say it anyway: Everyone just get a grip! (And read the whole thing, not just the parts you like or the parts you don’t like.)

I have things to say to people on both sides of the Confederate flag issue. First of all, you all need to understand that it means different things to different people. I keep seeing images of the flag on Facebook with the words, “If you are offended by this you don’t know history.” That is one of the most ridiculous things I have ever seen. If you can’t understand why some people find it not merely offensive but also deeply hurtful then YOU don’t know history. In fact, if you don’t understand that, you are shockingly, impossibly ignorant of history. Or else, you’ve just made up your own fantasy history or you are choosing to believe someone else’s fantasy history. Or, at best, you are picking and choosing the parts of history you like and ignoring the rest.

ON THE OTHER HAND, if you are one of the people who are offended by the Confederate flag, you need to understand that not everyone who displays it is racist. To some people it is a precious symbol of their culture. It’s not an exclusive culture and certainly not racist. Most of its members would be happy to let you in if you have a fondness for dirt roads, pickups, country music, hound dogs, cowboy boots and the like. And if not, they will still treat you decently even though they may not understand you. Most people who display the confederate flag really and truly do not care what race or ethnic group you belong to. Many of them come across as ignorant because they have had too little contact with people of other races but they are not intentionally racist.

Just because a lunatic carrying a confederate flag shot up a black church does not mean that every person who displays it is hateful. The U.S. flag has often been waved by people who believe that all Muslims should be murdered, gay people are going to Hell, all immigrants should be sent home, and all women should stay barefoot and pregnant and everyone understands that does not mean everyone who displays the U.S. flag is hateful. I know! I know! That is different. It really is. The Confederate flag carries a history that is undeniably one of racism and hatefulness but to the majority of the people who display it, it no longer holds that meaning. That is what you need to understand and accept.

And to those of you who are crying about the impending disappearance of your beloved symbol of the South: News flash! The Confederate flag has not been banned! Get a grip. Some states have decided to stop flying it in front of their state capitol buildings. So what? It has not been an official symbol of anything for over 150 years and does not belong in front of any official building. And several retailers have decided to stop selling it. So what? Retailers decide to stop selling products all the time, for all kinds of reasons. Given it’s popularity, there is no doubt that other businesses will spring up overnight for the express purpose of making and selling Confederate flags. And if you happen to think that it should be banned, you need to get a grip. Banning anything only makes it more popular. If you don’t know that then you really don’t know history.

Personally? I am from the south but I have no fondness for the confederate flag. I guess you could say that I find it slightly offensive. Even aside from the race issue, and in spite of the innocent things it represents to some people, I see it as representing a kind of willful ignorance. I would like to see people voluntarily give it up. But they won’t and that’s okay. Mostly, I think everyone should just leave everyone else alone. Let everyone have their symbols and don’t take anything too personally. After all, they’re only symbols. They don’t really mean anything at all.

First of all, I want to make it clear that I get it. I really do. I get why this upsets people and why so many people think it is “not okay”. I know that much history. But at the same time isn’t it a little ironic (Is that the right word? Ironic?) that this is going on at the same time that people are also spun up about Bruce Jenner becoming Caitlyn Jenner and we are all supposed to be completely supportive of that change? (Yes, yes, I know – that’s different.)

I’m not quite sure how I feel about the Rachel Dolezal issue. On the one hand, aside from any matters of race, she lied. She misrepresented herself. But on the other hand, try to imagine a world in which it is completely okay to define ourselves any way we like – a world in which anyone can truly be anything they want to be. If we could all be any race we wanted to be would race even matter? Isn’t that what we’ve always wanted? A world in which race doesn’t matter?

The husband and I spent this morning doing what we call “running around,” which means, “going to a lot of stores and only buying stuff at a couple of them.” When we were done with the running around, we noticed that it was a few minutes after noon and decided to stop at a fast food restaurant for some minimally nutritious tummy filler. Among the few other people who were eating in was a pair of not sweet, not little, old ladies who were forgetting to use their inside voices as they conversed about all manner of topics, about which they knew more than anyone else in the entire world, at least according to themselves. Though the volume made it a little difficult, we tried to ignore them and have a conversation of our own and were partially successful but a couple of sentences stood out: “Anyone who runs from the cops oughta be shot,” and “Just shoot ’em and get it over with.” One of the women repeated the last one several times.

Let’s start with the first statement: “Anyone who runs from the cops oughta be shot.” I’m not a saint. I will confess that the thought has crossed my mind that, “If you run from the cops of course you’re going to get shot. Don’t run! Duh!” But let’s consider the reasons a person might run. 1. He (or she; that’s the last time I’m going to say it) is guilty of murder. I don’t have any statistics to back this up but I’m guessing that this is the least likely reason. 2. He is guilty of a crime that does not carry the death penalty – for example, robbery, drug possession, being in the U.S. illegally, failure to pay traffic fines, etc. 3. He is not guilty of any crime but has been raised in an environment where he has learned to fear the cops. So, what these women were saying is that running from the cops merits the death penalty regardless of whether or not the runner has committed any other crimes. Further, they are saying that every cop has the right to be judge, jury, and executioner in all situations.

Now regarding the second statement, a notion which the woman seemed particularly proud of: “Just shoot ’em and get it over with.” In a certain kind of mind this is perfectly logical. If they’re obviously guilty why waste time and money on a trial? Make the world a safer place for law abiding citizens by taking the criminals out quickly and efficiently. But, aside from the obvious moral problem with this, in places where this is the way it’s done, the crime rate is not lower than in countries where it is left up to courts and juries to decide who is guilty and how the guilty are to be punished. Quite the opposite, in fact. I’m sure these two old bats are confident that they would never have to worry about getting shot by the police because, “obviously,” they are not guilty of any crime. This attitude is, at best, extremely naive. It’s been a long time since those two were in school and I’m thinking they have forgotten everything they learned in history class, if they were even paying attention in the first place.

As we were leaving the restaurant, the husband made dire threats of what he would do if I ever turned into that kind of old lady. He needn’t worry. However, there’s a distinct possibility that in another ten or twenty years I might turn into the kind of old lady who doesn’t hold back from giving other old ladies a good tongue lashing when I think they need it. Right now, I’m actually thinking it’s too bad those two old biddies will almost certainly never read this.

I hate when people take an ordinary thing and make it a symbol. Now it seems sunflowers are controversial. At least they are in China. I hope this won’t spread to the U.S. just because a pop star happened to bumble upon a political symbol. Though the Taiwan flag bit didn’t help matters any.

By the way, in response to the Chinese fan who said, “These performers who intervene in other countries’ politics are the most annoying.” (And I really wish that person and anyone else who feels that way could read this.) No, what is really annoying to you is that other people are allowed to have opinions that are different from yours. Having an opinion about other countries’ politics is not the same thing as “intervening” in other countries politics. Grow up and get over yourself.

But, ordinary things as symbols… That really gets under my skin. Now, flags are symbols. They were purposely created to represent a particular country, state, people, or ideology. A flag is a legitimate symbol. Colors and plants are not. Green is just green. Pink is just pink. And flowers are just flowers. If you need a symbol stop being lazy and create a flag or a logo and just let the natural world be.

Last night on CBS news they had a segment about McDonald’s severely declining profits and mentioned some vague “plan” to lure back customers which probably doesn’t even come close to what they really need to do: get customers’ orders right! I haven’t been to a McDonald’s in a number of years (5? More?) for that very reason. (That and the food is mostly okay but not that great. If I’m going to eat something that bad for me it’s going to be really outrageously delicious.) Literally the last five times we went there at lunch or dinner time* they got our order wrong. Usually it was something minor, like the wrong size drink or something but still, every time no matter which McDonald’s location I go to. (*To give them some credit, they do seem to be able to not screw up a sausage biscuit and orange juice.)

Well, this morning I saw this: Woman shoots at a McDonald’s because there was no bacon on her bacon burger. OMG! No bacon?! Seriously, I totally understand. But, even more seriously, punishing McDonald’s employees for incompetence is not worth going to prison. Just go somewhere else. A lot of other places have bacon burgers and most of them are better than McDonald’s. It might not be as immediately satisfying but there’s no better or more appropriate punishment for a business than taking your business elsewhere. One might think that if enough people stop eating there they will finally get it but, realistically, if they haven’t figured it out by now it’s hard to believe they ever will.

I started to include this in my usual Quotes post but I decided that the part I want to quote is rather long for that so here it is, all by itself. From this Interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Now, where the rubber hits the road is, since we are a free country where belief systems are constitutionally protected — provided they don’t infringe on the rights of others — then how do you have governance over “all” when you have belief systems for the “some”? It seems to me that the way you govern people is you base governance on things that are objectively true; that are true regardless of your belief system, or no matter what the tenets are of your holy documents. And then they should base it on objective truths that apply to everyone. So the issue comes about not that there are religious people in the world that have one view over another, it’s if you have one view or another based on faith and you want to legislate that in a way that affects everyone. That’s no longer a free democracy. That’s a country where the few who have a belief system that’s not based in objective reality want to control the behavior of everyone else.

Thinking about incidents in the news… actually thought about writing something about it… but what I had to say really just boils down to this and it doesn’t apply only to one particular incident or people.

Like it or not you are a representative of your group. We all belong to groups: your race, your religion, your political party, your home state. And even if you’re not religious or don’t support any particular political party those are groups too. You don’t necessarily put yourself in these groups. It also can be what other people see you as. Whatever group or category other people identify you with, you are a representative of that group. What you do affects how people who are not in your group think about people like you. If you are a religious person and you support candidates who say they will pass laws that will take away the rights of some citizens, people may think that members of your religion are closed-minded and don’t care about other people. If you are an atheist and you swear a lot and generally break the rules of decent society, people may think that all atheists are immoral. If you happen to be a cop and you shoot an unarmed person several times, people who are not cops may fear and hate cops because of what you did. If a member of your group suffers an injustice and you and a few other members of your group riot and loot, people who are not members of your group may think that people in your group are more likely to be thugs and criminals. If you threaten, intimidate, and kill people and you talk about your religion a lot people who are not of your religion will think that believers in your religion are more likely to be terrorists.

That’s stereotyping. It’s not fair and it’s not right but you can’t end it by just saying, “Stereotyping is wrong. Don’t do it,” because that’s just how people are made. Even people who know it’s wrong are affected by what they observe in the world. They may know most cops are not murderers, most black people are not thugs, most white people are not racists, most Muslims are not terrorists but still notice these behaviors and be affected by them. Whoever you are, you are a representative of your group. Be, at all times, the kind of person you want other people to consider “typical” of your group.

I generally don’t do politics but this is too good to pass up: This Land Is Mine. There is plenty of reason for sympathy for both sides and plenty of reason to blame both sides. Most people only see blame on only one side or the other though.

Anyway, both sides are wrong; both sides are right. It’s been going on for thousands of years and there’s only one way the situation will ever be resolved. Aliens. That’s right, aliens invade the Earth and either kill everyone or they go all Mom on everyone and say, “I don’t care who started it. We are going to finish it,” and with technology so advanced it seems like magic to us poor, backward humans, they simply stop all fighting. I know, I know! Shut up. This is MY fantasy and it will go the way I want it to.

Living ethically is a lot of work and I’m lazy. I care. I really do, but I don’t even know how to find out these things. I have to rely on the media to tell me about things like the fire in Bangladesh so I will know which clothing not to buy. But things get really complicated. Look at the labels. It’s all made in Bangladesh or some other place where children work 16 hours a day for fifty cents and are beaten for complaining. It makes one want to throw up one’s hands and say, “Well, sheesh! Why don’t we all just start sewing together leaves from the plants in our back yards and wear those?”

Thanks to the demand, there are now a few companies producing ethical clothing. (There’s no way I can write that sentence that doesn’t look weird.) If you work at it you can live ethically. But can you trust the claims of people who are trying to make money? And if you buy clothing that is 100% made in the USA are you starving some orphan in Bangladesh who was counting on that fifty cents a day, however hard earned it might have been?

I do appreciate that there are people out there keeping a watch out for this kind of thing. Just by reporting they can force manufacturers to clean up their acts. So keep reporting and I will shop ethically when I can. Just don’t expect me to go nuts about something over which I have no control.

Today is a big day. Well, not really. Today is the first time this year that I am wearing a spring/summer dress. It’s this one, since I’m not planning on going anywhere today. I briefly considered wearing the crazy pink one. Anyway, I love dresses. They feel so free. That’s why this is sort of a minor big deal to me. It’s supposed to be cooler tomorrow though so it’s not quite time to put away the slacks yet.

It is definitely time to start summer sewing (I’m almost finished with a long sleeve cotton blouse, which I hope to be able to show off tomorrow but probably won’t get around to until early next week.) but I just realized that I do not have anything to sew that does not require some notion or trim or lining or something that I do not have yet. So I will have to either go to Tulsa in the next day or two or order stuff and wait a week. The latter is probably what I’ll do. I suppose it’s not a bad thing to take a short break from sewing. I can still work on that darned quilt that I’ve been stalled on for what seems like forever and I’ve got a couple of quilt tops I could be working on. But I’ve got the bug. I have pretty pieces of fabric that I want to sew now.

Remember I was talking about homemade shoes yesterday? Well, I was looking for the soling material and found these Xero Shoes kits. They’re very minimalist sandals. I don’t know… I don’t really like the look. I did also find the Vibram soling sheets at Amazon. That stuff is EXPENSIVE but there are some other brands. I’m not sure I’m quite ready to jump off into shoe making yet but I’m thinking about it.

Interesting article about the Hobby Lobby case. I don’t know what to think about this. I’m not familiar with the site but I’m sure it’s not exactly unbiased. (I saw this on Facebook) I’m not normally a very politically committed person. I don’t make purchasing decisions based on politics. It just gets too complicated. But I have to admit this thing with Hobby Lobby has really bothered me and made me not want to go there anymore. I don’t shop there very often but they have a small sewing department that is a little better than Walmart’s and there’s one closer to me than Tulsa. If what the article says is true it’s still not enough to make me completely change my mind about the case but it goes to show that the issues are more complex than the talking heads make them out to be and people on both sides of the political fence ignore anything that is inconvenient for their side.

Well, I don’t want to end on a political note but I’m fresh out of relevant and interesting [/sarcasm] things to say at the moment so how about a couple o’ cats. All together now: AAAWWWWWWWW….

He says several things in this video that I particularly like. At about 3:50 he says that “maybe there is something in the brain’s wiring that prevents some people from becoming atheists.” In a way, I don’t want to believe that because I don’t like to believe that a certain way of thinking (whatever it is) is “pre-wired” but, on the other hand, this explains a lot and, as I (and others) have said before, brains are weird. I also respect him for trying to avoid politicizing science, though that’s often impossible.

I wish I could introduce Neil deGrasse Tyson to my grandmother. Actually I wish I could introduce a lot of people to my grandmother. She was extremely conservative. She thought almost everything on TV was immoral in one way or another. It’s probably not surprising that she objected to I Dream of Jeannie but she even considered The Lawrence Welk Show immoral because when the young ladies on the show danced and whirled around you could see their knees and (gasp!) sometimes even their thighs. From knees to belly buttons to kids smarting off at their parents there was no show so wholesome she couldn’t find something wrong with it. (and we’re talking about the 60’s, when TV couples slept in twin beds) She had similar opinions about real life behavior. You might assume from this that she was an unpleasant person but she wasn’t at all. She was usually cheerful and pleasant and never preachy but when certain subjects came up she would certainly tell you what she thought.

My grandmother read the Bible every day and believed in it and considered it a guide for living but one thing she did not believe was that the world was created in only six days. She understood that the Bible was never meant to be taken literally. I can clearly remember when I was very small she explained to me that both Genesis and evolution were true because the Bible said that to God a thousand years were as one day, which, of course, she also did not take literally. The world was not created in six thousand years any more than it was created in six days.

That one person could believe both the Bible and the true time scale of evolution and that humans evolved from a single cell, up through amphibians, small mammals, primates, early hominids to modern humans, does not compute for some people but I say, “Why not?!” We all believe things that are much more unlikely than that. My grandmother did not care for conflict. She did her best to educate her children, grandchildren, nieces and nephews but was content to leave strangers to believe anything they liked, but I know that if asked she would have said that creationists reduce God to human scale because they are not capable of grasping anything greater.

My grandmother was actually very interested in science. To her, science was the study of God’s creation so you had to get it right. I’m sure there are people who would say that she was cheating, that she had been convinced of the scientific truth of evolution but still couldn’t let go of religion. Perhaps there’s some truth to that. So what? People manage to reconcile seemingly conflicting ideas in their minds all the time, maybe because these ideas are not really as opposite or mutually exclusive to one another as some have been led to believe. Maybe someone with an agenda decided that a conflict would be to their advantage, created one, and convinced a lot of other people. Oh man, I wish I had that kind of talent! The talent to convince people. Well, if I can’t maybe Dr. Tyson can – the kids at least.

Here’s an old favorite of mine, posted in memory of the “Reverend” Fred Phelps, may he soon be forgotten.

A Pagan died and, much to her surprise, found herself at the Pearly
Gates facing St. Peter. He walked up to her and said, “Hello, and
welcome.”
She stared at St. Peter in complete confusion. “Wait a minute,” she
said. “I was supposed to end up in the Summerlands.” He smiled. “Ah, you
must be one of our Pagan sisters. Follow me, please.”

Peter gestured for her to follow him down a small path which went
through the gates and down a bit to the left. They walked for a short
while, then he stepped back and gestured her forward. Looking past his hand,
she saw the verdant fields and forests of her desired Summerlands. She saw
people feasting, dancing, and making merry, exactly as she expected.
While standing there in wonder, the Pagan happened to glance over to one
side and saw a small group of people near the edge of the Summerlands. The
people in the group were watching the revelers, but not joining them.
Instead, they were screaming and weeping piteously.

The Pagan looked at St. Peter. “Who are those people?”

St. Peter replied, “Them? They’re fundamentalists. They’re a bit
surprised to see you all there, so they stand there and carry on like
that all day.”

“Why? Don’t they have better things to do?” asked the Pagan.

Peter leaned conspiratorially toward her. “They don’t really have a
choice. They’re actually in Hell. God doesn’t like being told what He
thinks.”

Maybe we should actually read those user agreements before we click Accept. On the other hand, does it really matter? It’s not like we can negotiate a more agreeable agreement.

Capital One specifies that they can contact their customers by any means they choose, including telephone, email, text message, or even “personal visit.” Well, of course we all knew they could do that anyway but seeing it written out that way does make it seem rather creepy.

They also say, “We may modify or suppress caller ID and similar services and identify ourselves on these services in any manner we choose.” Now that’s beyond creepy. If you ask me, (and, sadly, no one ever will) that should be a capital offense. (See what I did there.)

I am all over the place politically. I am neither left, right, nor center. I like to say I’m somewhere out in space. I have opinions that would creep out, offend and horrify conservatives and other opinions that would creep out, offend and horrify liberals and some opinions that would just confuse everyone. But I have found a statement – perhaps you could call it a mantra – that is useful in many, many different situations: “It’s none of my business. It doesn’t affect me personally.” Just keep saying that to yourself, over and over again, until you believe it.

That’s what it seems like sometimes, watching the national evening news, which I really only watch for entertainment and the occasional blog fodder. Last night the weather was the lead story and the anchor dramatically announced that there were freezing temperatures in every state in the continental U.S. That is pretty significant. You would think that they would focus on those parts of the country that rarely have freezing temperatures, such as Florida and southern Louisiana, and the hardships of those who are not prepared for such cold but they only talked about places like New York and Philadelphia and interviewed a few well-dressed people complaining about how cold it is.

Maybe the south doesn’t provide enough drama or maybe it’s because, generally, even unprepared, southerners deal with bad stuff pretty well and therefore do not fit into the mainstream media’s preferred narrative regarding the people of the south and flyover country. I didn’t hear anything about North Dakota either and I’m sure many people there, like many people here in Oklahoma, have to drive 30 or 40 miles to work and can’t just walk to work or take the train when the weather is “too bad to drive”. Maybe they just don’t know how to report things like that. Maybe they are reduced to, “How do those people even live?”

It seems to me that any reasonable person seeing the headline, TSA Seizes Sock Monkey’s Toy Gun, would automatically assume that it’s from The Onion or a similar humor website. Sadly, it’s on a more serious site. Perhaps I should stop making fun of people who mistake The Onion for real news. It’s hard to tell the difference these days.

Vancouver has banned doorknobs. What the…? What? Apparently they’re more difficult for elderly and arthritic persons to open. I should be more sympathetic I guess but I really hope this idea doesn’t take off in the U.S. Every time I see one of those lever-style door handles I think, “I bet my cat could open that.” In fact my cat sometimes reaches for the doorknob. I actually sort of doubt he could successfully perform the entire pulling the lever and opening the door operation, but I’m pretty sure there are some dogs that could. I don’t know… I suppose some people might want their dogs to be able to open doors but I like having a little control. The ability to open doors is the one power I have over my cats.

Of course the real issue is that the levers look too modern no matter how antique-brassy they are and it’s nobody’s business what kind of hardware I have on my doors.

There has recently been some controversy over the name of a street in Tulsa – Brady Street. Some people wanted it renamed because Tate Brady, whom it was named for, was a Klan member. But people like their street names and hate change, and besides, it would cost money to change all the signs. So, last night Tulsa city councilors voted to “rename” Brady Street for civil war photographer Matthew Brady. If one wanted to be snarky one could say they could just as well have “renamed” it after Mike Brady on The Brady Bunch, but I like it. Rarely in politics has there ever been such a handy solution to a problem.

Wow. Preach it, sister. This absolutely wonderful screed has already gone viral but I just have to say this is awesome. This is exactly the kind of thing I’m always saying or thinking only she said it better. There is so much there that is quoteable but I especially like this bit:

The fact that I’m not fixating on the perfect purity of my food and not doing it to those around me means I have a pretty good quality of life.

I’m fortunate that I don’t often run into people who bother me about my food choices but if I did I think I would be tempted to print out copies of this and pass them out to the busybodies.

Do you ever, a few days after a major news event, find yourself wishing that something else Big and Important would happen just so the media would move on already? I mean… it doesn’t have to be anything really tragic, just, say, something like a group of Republican congressmen from the bible belt hire a bunch of prostitutes and have a drunken orgy. Could we maybe make that happen?